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Ares
Ares is the Greek god of war, violence and bloodshed, as well as the patron for warriors and fighters. In literature, he represents the violent side of war, in stark contrast to the armoured Athena, who represents the strategical and tactical side of war. Among the Greeks, Ares was always mistrusted for he was seen as an erratic god of savage slaughter and bloodlust."You are the most hateful to me of the gods who hold Olympus," Zeus tells him in the Iliad ( 5.890); "forever strife is dear to you and wars and slaughter". The counterpart of Ares among the Roman gods is Mars, who as a father of the Roman people was given a more important and dignified place in ancient Roman religion for his agricultural and tutelary functions. During the Hellenization of Latin literature, the myths of Ares were reinterpreted by Roman writers under the name of Mars. Greek writers under Roman rule also recorded cult practices and beliefs pertaining to Mars under the name of Ares. Thus in the classical tradition of later Western art and literature, the mythology of the two figures becomes virtually indistinguishable. He is one of the Twelve Olympians, and the son of Zeus and Hera. Ares plays a relatively limited role in Greek mythology as represented in literary narratives, though his numerous love affairs and abundant offspring are often alluded to. When Ares does appear in myths, he typically faces humiliation. He is well known as the lover of Aphrodite, the goddess of love, who was married to Hephaestus, god of craftsmanship. The most famous story related to Ares and Aphrodite shows them exposed to ridicule through the wronged husband's clever device. His symbols were the boar, vulture and a bloody spear. Phobos (Fear) and Deimos (Fear) were his attendants, and accompanied him into war, striking fear and terror into his enemies. Name Etymology The etymology of the name Ares is traditionally connected with the Greek word ἀρή (arē), the Ionic form of the Doric ἀρά (ara), "bane, ruin, curse, imprecation".Online Etymology Dictionary; Are, Georg Autenrieth, A Homeric Dictionary, at Perseus; Are, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, at Perseus Walter Burkert notes that "Ares is apparently an ancient abstract noun meaning throng of battle, war."Walter Burkert, Greek Religion (Harvard) 1985:pt III.2.12 p 169. The earliest attested form of the name is the Mycenaean Greek a-re, written in Linear B syllabic script. Ephithets Homeric and other poetic epithets applied to the god include:-- Ares in myth Trojan War In the Iliad, Homer represented Ares as having no fixed allegiances nor respect for Themis, the right ordering of things: he promised Athena and Hera that he would fight on the side of the Achaeans, but Aphrodite was able to persuade Ares to side with the Trojans (Iliad V.699). During the war, Diomedes fought with Hector and saw Ares fighting on the Trojans' side. Diomedes called for his soldiers to fall back slowly. Hera, Ares's mother, saw his interference and asked Zeus, his father, for permission to drive Ares away from the battlefield. Hera encouraged Diomedes to attack Ares, so he threw a spear at Ares and his cries made Achaeans and Trojans alike tremble. Athena then drove the spear into Ares' body, making him bellow in pain and flea to Mt. Olympus, forcing the Trojans to fall back (XXI.391). Later when Zeus allows the gods to fight in the war again, Ares tries to fight Athena to avenge himself for his previous injury, but is once again badly injured when she tosses a huge boulder on him. Aloadae In one archaic myth, related only in the Iliad by the goddess Dione to her daughter Aphrodite, two chthonic giants, the Aloadae, named Otus and Ephialtes, threw Ares into chains and put him in a bronze urn, where he remained for thirteen months, a lunar year. "And that would have been the end of Ares and his appetite for war, if the beautiful Eriboea, the young giants' stepmother, had not told Hermes what they had done," she related. Ares remained screaming and howling in the urn until Hermes rescued him and Artemis tricked the Aloadae into slaying each other. The founding of Thebes One of the many roles of Ares was in the founding of Thebes. Ares was the progenitor of the water-dragon slain by Cadmus, and hence the ancestor of the Spartans (the dragon's teeth were sown into the ground, and sprung up as the fully armored autochthonic Spartans). From the dragon's teeth, sown as if a crop, arose a race of fighting men, the descendents of Ares. To propitiate Ares, Cadmus took as a bride Harmonia, daughter of Ares' union with Aphrodite, thus harmonizing all strife and founding the city of Thebes. Aphrodite In the myth sung by the bard in the hall of Alcinous (Odyssey viii.300ff) the Sun-God, Helios, once spied Ares and Aphrodite enjoying each other secretly in the hall of Hephaestus and how he promptly reported the incident to Aphrodite's Olympian consort. Hephaestus contrived to catch the couple in the act, and so he fashioned a net with which to snare the illicit lovers. At the appropriate time, this net was sprung, and trapped Ares and Aphrodite locked in embrace. However, Hephaestus was not yet satisfied with his revenge and he invited the Olympian gods and goddesses to view the unfortunate pair. For the sake of modesty, the goddesses demurred, but the male gods went to witness the sight. Some commented on the beauty of Aphrodite, others remarked that they would eagerly trade places with Ares, but all mocked the two. Once the couple was unrestrained, Ares, embarrassed, sped away to his homeland, Thrace. In a much later interpolated detail, Ares put the youth Alectryon by his door to warn them of Helios' arrival, as Helios would tell Hephaestus of Aphrodite's infidelity if the two were discovered, but Alectryon fell asleep. Helios discovered the two and alerted Hephaestus. Ares was furious and turned Alectryon into a rooster, which now never forgets to announce the arrival of the sun in the morning. Miscellany on Ares * Ares slew the giant Ekhidnades, a monstrous enemy of the gods. * He assisted the Trojan armies in their war against the Greeks, but was wounded in an encounter with the hero Diomedes and the goddess Athena. * Ares was caught in an invisible net by the god Hephaestus whilst committing adultery with the god's wife Aphrodite. * He bestowed a "manly" spirit upon his daughters, the warrior Amazons. * Ares turned Cadmus and Harmonia into snakes for killing one of his sacred animals. Consorts and children Divine offspring In modern culture Books *Ares is a main character in the book series The Underland Chronicles by Suzanne Collins. *In Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, Ares is a major antagonist and he is a supporting character in the rest of the series. He, later, reappears as Mars in the spin-off series, Heroes of Olympus, and is revealed to be the father of one of the main characters, Frank Zhang. *In John C. Wright's Chronicles of Chaos, he is a major character, an influential faction to be appeased when dealing with the children. Comics *In Planet Comics there was a strip called Mars God of War, featuring a character based on Ares under the name of Mars. This character was a villain who took over people's bodies in attempts to cause war. Television Music *In pop music English band Bloc Party recorded a song "Ares" on their third album Intimacy. Japanese pop artist Gackt has a song named Ares on his second solo album, Mars (album). Portrayal In Greek art he was depicted as either a mature, bearded warrior dressed in battle arms, or a nude beardless youth with helm and spear. Because of his lack of distinctive attributes he is often difficult to identify in classical art. Attributes Chariot His chariot was drawn by the fire breathing horses Aithon (Red-Fire), Phlogios (Flame), Konabos (Tumult) and Phobos (Fear), and his charioteer was Enyo, the goddess of bloodlust. Gallery AresStatue.jpg Ares2.jpg References ---- ----